In February 2007, I proposed a novel way to preserve the strength of the public financing system in the 2008 election. My plan requires both major party candidates to agree on a fundraising truce, return excess money from donors, and stay within the public financing system for the general election. My proposal followed announcements by some presidential candidates that they would forgo public financing so they could raise unlimited funds in the general election. The Federal Election Commission ruled the proposal legal, and Senator John McCain (R-AZ) has already pledged to accept this fundraising pledge. If I am the Democratic nominee, I will aggressively pursue an agreement with the Republican nominee to preserve a publicly financed general election.

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Big deal or not?
Is there anyway to discuss this without flame-retardent suits?

It's true that Obama is going against his previous statements, and he will have to deal with that specific criticism. But the tens of thousands of people who built up his war chest with small donations (like me) want that money to be used to give him a competitive advantage. It's an overall net gain for him.

It isn't something that will resonate very far, because people don't care, but he is going to get hammered with it. And rightly so. He was saying one thing, now he is doing something different. That makes it fair fodder. I can't blame him, based on his fundraising ability, but he screwed up. Majorly. When he was still an underdog and didn't realize he would be able to harness the power of small donors and be the fundraising juggernaut he has turned into, he probably thought that the fundraising playing field would be equal if he made it to a general election, and he figured he could use it as an issue to make himself seem like he had more integrity than other candidates -- he was going to be the campaign finance reform guy and paint his opponents as pigs feeding at the PAC trough. Now that he knows he can rake in way more money than McCain, he has lost his religion. It's particularly ugly for him, because McCain was the one who ended up getting the Republican nomination, and McCain was the other guy playing that same game, except it is now beneficial for McCain to hold true to his word. So you have two guys who made a pledge -- the only two, I believe, out of all the candidates who started out running -- and you have the contrast now of one who is staying true to his word and one who isn't.

As far as I can tell, Obama tried to broker a deal with McCain. But he wanted McCain to police the 527 activity, and McCain refused. What good is public financing if you can get a bunch of 527s to run the attack ads you can't afford?

Unfortunately, while Obama's argument is nuanced and reasonable to an intelligent person, all you'll hear from the GOP is "Barack Obama broke his promise to the American people."

But fortunately, Ragu is right. People likely aren't going to care about this. There's bigger fish to fry right now.